“No Strings Attached”

In the past, Valient Thorr have skewed toward the incensed and the political, using their ricocheting guitar leads and surly frontman Valient Himself to rail against several systems in sequence. Their latest, Our Own Masters, doesn’t shift dramatically from that path. It does, however, drop an irrepressible love song about friendship and solidarity in the first half, and it’s one of the most joyous and winning moments of Valient Thorr’s decade-plus as a band. “No Strings Attached” opens like a standard Thorr anthem, riff unfurling over thudding drums and alongside another gruff pronouncement from Himself.

But note the emergent positivity: “I feel like the world is getting better,” he sings, as if surprising himself. Racing through shout-out-loud bursts and electric lines that peal into triumphant little parts, the next three minutes springboard from that admission. Together, they all funnel into the kind of chorus that makes you want to find a convertible or hug someone or, simpler still, listen again and again: “I’ll do anything I can now for you, baby/ That’s a guarantee, no strings attached.” There’s a heart beneath that denim, folks.